MORE INSIGHT ON MESOAMERICA VS. HEARTLAND

Some basics...

Greetings Readers and Tennis Shoes Fans!

I have great discussions on Facebook, and I wonder if the info ever gets "seen" by anyone, except perhaps the person who brings up the topic. Recently I had someone discuss their perspective on Mesoamerica and Book of Mormon connections, which is discussed at some length in my latest podcast, "Battle of the Book of Mormon Geographies."  In one post I emphasized the legitimacy of pursuing Book of Mormon connections in the Great Lakes and other areas of the United States, but I also offered this tidbit of information that is too often ignored by those who are determined to tout an Eastern United States connection to The Book of Mormon. Certainly there's still some digging to do, but any Mesoamerican archeologist would confirm the following paragraph without hesitation:

"There's really no comparison between Mesoamerica and the Midwest or Great Lakes regions of the United States. In southern Mexico, Honduras, and Guatemala archaeological strata are unearthed every time the foundation of a house is dug. Pottery is found in practically everyone's back yard. SO MUCH has been plowed under or destroyed. The stuff is literally EVERYWHERE. You can't throw a rock without hitting evidence of the ancient civilizations. In the continental U.S., yes, we have some nice "mound-builder" sites--Hopewell and Adema (which designations are just place-holder names, like "Olmec". There WAS no tribe called the Hopewells or the Olmecs. Those are simply modern designations to identify certain cultures in the New World. We really don't know what they called themselves) but there's just no comparison with the sheer volume of artifacts and structures and WORK still to be done in Mesoamerica. I've posted a few photos of Hopewell sites in the Eastern U.S.

Very little in the mound-builder cultures dates to the right time periods--about 95% of what has been unearthed is POST Book of Mormon. Now, that doesn't mean there isn't a connection. D&C 32 verfies that. Further work should be pursued and MUST be pursued. But let's look at the general facts. For the most part in the Eastern U.S. we find mounds and stone fences, a few petroglyphs, stone buildings (for heiroglyphs and petroglyphs we're mostly venturing east of the Mississippi, to the Anasazi of New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona). The main missing ingredient in Ohio or Georgia or Great Lakes archaeology is the volume of glyphs--evidences of complex writing systems. Yeah, there are some strange anomalies in the States that demand investigation, but these are much more rare, and so unique when they ARE found, that it makes headlines because, well, we're AMERICANS, and we pride ourselves--and give much publicity--to things we discover inside our own borders.  (Even the image that I presented as the cover of this blog--the "Bat Creek Stone" found in Tennessee--is classified as fraudulent by most archeologists. However, genunie evidences of examples of ancient writing literally "overfloweth" in Mesoamerica, which is precisely what we oughta expect from the literate cultures associated with the peoples of The Book of Mormon. Right?

Just two cents that I hope offer information worthy of contemplation.

Stay close to the Lord,

Chris Heimerdinger